At first glance, last night’s headlining XPNFest pairing was an unusual one. Theatrical, otherworldly indie rock diety St. Vincent played first, followed by a set from jam-intensive roots / Americana faves My Morning Jacket – how was this going to work?

As it turned out, it worked out phenomenally, and the artists has more in common than meets the eye. Both boast some of the best living guitarists in rock – Annie Clark, the woman behind St. Vincent, as well as Jim James and Carl Broemel, the dueling duo at the front of MMJ. Both have a strong artistic sensibility to what they do – St. Vincent’s cerebral pop songs and clever choreography, MMJ’s expressive and expansive jams. And both have songs that totally slay in concert – St. Vincent’s “Actor Out of Work” and “Digital Witness,” MMJ’s “Lay Low” and “One Big Holiday,” just to name a handful.

St. Vincent hit the SBC stage at 8 sharp, and wasted no time energizing the crowd with “Birth In Reverse” – which featured an intricate, ballet-step back-and-forth with guitarist Toko Yasuda. Clark is a charismatic performer and knows how to connect with the crowd – saying hello to “Camden, New Jersey slash Philly” during “Rattlesnake” and referencing regional luminaries Questlove, Jill Scott and Ben Franklin on her lead-in to “Marrow.”

“Your favorite Hall and Oates quote goes like this,” she said. “‘Now there’s no use you resisting / This is the Cradle Thief insisting / I think you better let me have it my way / Fool around with me, come on mess around with me.'”

When she wasn’t doing a dramatic reading of “I’m Just A Kid (Don’t Make Me Feel Like A Man)” or dancing in the light show – the spots during “Cheerleader” bounced off her face and guitar, creating an alluring glow – she was shredding. The solo in “Prince Johnny” was sick, albeit more traditional rock and roll style; the guitar outro to “Surgeon” was avant-garde and dissonent. Either way had her devotees shrieking with joy, as well as the MMJ bro crowd who had no idea what to expect whispering amongst themselves how surprised they were.

As for MMJ – they did what they do best: rocked, and rocked, and rocked some more. Their set opened with a steller take on “Off the Record” from 2005’s Z, plowing directly into the new “Compound Fracture” and “First Light” from Circuital, which featured Broemel taking a crazy saxophone solo.

The band definitely favored the less-talk-more-rock approach, moving from song to song with the quickness. It wasn’t until after a hammering take on “Lay Low” that the band paused and James talked about how thrilled he was to share the stage with St. Vincent, “one of the best guitar players…ever. Unbelievable.”

Before coming over to SBC, the band apparently spent some time over at Camden’s Adventure Aquarium, and James shared a story about his encounter with a hippo: “I stood face to face with it and looked death in the eye,” he said with a touch of faux-dramtics. “I stood face to face as it opened its mouth. It was like staring into the eyes of all life.”

This ushered on Waterfall‘s “Spring (Among the Living),” at which point their set took its own side-trip into the exploratory and surreal. “Dondante” was jammed out for 15 minutes of very subtle playing and gradual buildups – it seemed like it had been going on for a while aready, and then Broemel grabbed his sax again to space it out a bit more. The set stayed into this darker, brooding corner for about a half hour before being rescued by the celebratory “Circuital” and closing in a big way with the live staple “Mahgeetah.”

For an encore, the band played Waterfall standout “Believe” as well as an explosive disco-fied rendition of “Touch Me I’m Going To Scream Pt. 2” and wrapping on the classic “One Big Holiday.” All told it was two hours and 15 of MMJ and close to four hours of musical magic overall. Check out photos and setlist from the show below.

]]>http://thekey.xpn.org/2015/07/26/xpnfest-recep-st-vincent-my-morning-jacket/feed/0Foo Fighters rocked SBC harder on crutches than most bands on their own two feethttp://thekey.xpn.org/2015/07/15/foo-fighters-sbc/
http://thekey.xpn.org/2015/07/15/foo-fighters-sbc/#respondWed, 15 Jul 2015 20:17:25 +0000http://thekey.xpn.org/?p=166982Continued]]>

The show must go on… For Dave Grohl that means wheeling out on stage in a giant throne of beheaded guitars and flashing lights. He is pretty spry for a guy with a cast on his leg and limited mobility. He’s spry for a guy that’s in his mid-40s and has been doing this for close to 30 years. Foo Fighters have been doing it for 20 already. While I wouldn’t peg them as revolutionaries of rock n’ roll, their cross-generational appeal does put them on a pedestal with legends like Led Zeppelin, AC/DC, and The Who. They live the rock n roll lifestyle like it’s 2015, however. They’re not burning down hotel rooms or being found in some alley after a three-day binge. In fact, outside of in-your-face enthusiasm, Dave and Taylor Hawkins – who seemingly appears the most alongside Grohl in interviews – seem like a pretty chill group of friends.

Ladies Love Cool Dave… But, for all the massive talent involved, Dave is the sun around which this universe is revolving. Despite his limitations during his second Susquehanna Bank Center show of the summer – the tour was re-branded, replete with merch, as the “Break A Leg Tour” (#DadJokes) – he squirmed and shifted, screamed and cursed through the legendary catalog the best he could. I always loved the Foo Fighters ability to consistently connect to the crowd throughout their songs. Taking TV shows and turning them in to movies, taking breaks during the slow parts to hype the crowd up for the inevitable climax.

They definitely hit the ground running (sorry!) with a raucous renditions of “Everlong” and “Monkey Wrench.” They also delivered on their promise of a long night, racking up 25-ish songs (including a nice acoustic set in the middle). All-in-All the Foo Fighters did what they do best – rock. They did it the best they could on crutches.

Warm it up… I skipped over the Royal Blood album when it came out. I’m so so so so sorry I did. The mates from Brighton were a fierce rock duo. Spitting out a nice set of blues infused garage rock, they did everything in their power to fill the huge stage with their presence, and it worked. A perfect compliment to the Foo and a righteous band in their own right.

Variety is the spice of life… There are some things on the internet that have to do with Foo Fighters and photographers, and WXPN is not my soapbox for that, so don’t worry. I did, however, want to comment that I usually try to get a wide variety of shots and show all aspects of an event. It’s something I pride myself on. But due to restrictions beyond my control, it was not possible at this show. That said, check out at the gallery below to see the Foos in action, rocking out at SBC.

Setlist
Everlong
Monkey Wrench
Learn to Fly
Something From Nothing
The Pretender
Up in Arms
Congregation
Walk
Band Introduction: Panama (Van Halen cover) / Heart of the Sunrise (Yes cover) / Tom Sawyer (Rush cover)
Cold Day in the Sun
My Hero (Acoustic)
Times Like These (Acoustic)
Under Pressure (Queen & David Bowie cover)
All My Life
These Days
Outside
Breakout
Generator
This Is a Call
Breakdown (Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers cover)
Aurora
White Limo
Arlandria
Tie Your Mother Down (Queen cover)
Detroit Rock City (KISS cover)
Best of You

So Dave Grohl’s cast is reportedly off, but its unclear whether tonight’s Foo Fighters headlining show at Susquehanna Bank Center – their second Philly-area gig of the summer – will be played via throne or or in traditional standing stance. Either way it’s cool, since the previous Camden show reportedly ruled. Below, check out two fan videos of the July 6th SBC show: an acoustic rendition of “My Hero” matched with a driving electric take on “Pretender.” Need more convincing? Here’s a then-and-now comparison of Foo Fighters Philly-area concerts. Tickets and more information on tonight’s encore gig can be found at the XPN Concert Calendar.

Wait a minute, a Foo Fighters preview followed by a Mighty Mighty Bosstones preview…what year is it? Seriously though, while these Boston-based ska-core stalwarts have had ups and downs over their 30-plus year (!!) career, you’ve got to hand it to them: they started doing ska when it was tremendously uncool, helped make it massively cool for a hot minute in the 90s, and kept doing it after the superficial coolness had subsided. Gotta hand it to them further: when the trendy crowds were swarming in, frontman Dicky Barrett was very much about making Bosstones gigs a safe space and was not at all shy about calling out and dressing down the dudebro faction of the audience for sexist / aggro / unnecessarily macho behavior during shows. Plus “Someday I Suppose” is a rager. Tickets and info on tonight’s show can be found here.

There was a time, many moons ago, when Dave Grohl wasn’t the in-yer-face rocker dude taking the stage at arenas around the globe with a guitar and a broken leg on a somewhat ridiculous throne. When his Sonic Highways HBO series didn’t have devotees trying to convince us that the was the lone savior of a vanishing generation of rock n’ roll (a point up for discussion among the music intelligentsia).

There was a time when Grohl was a goofy, humble former drummer of a colossally successful 90s rock band who was starting over in a solo project and hoping that some fans would be along for the ride. 18 years ago this weekend, Foo Fighters came through Philadelphia on tour in support of their sophomore album The Colour and the Shape. It was a hot July night; Supergrass opened the show. Some people came just for them, left early and are probably kicking themselves today.

Colour was a leap forward for Grohl the songwriter and frontman. Foo’s self-titled debut from 1995 was recorded before there was really a band in place; Grohl played most instruments, making for an eccentric and somewhat introverted set (though definitely loud – see “I’ll Stick Around” and “Wattershed”). By contrast, Colour was tight and focused, loud and anthemic, a definite band record filled with undeniable hooks (“Monkey Wrench,” “My Hero”), fist-pumping energy (“Enough Space,” “Hey, Johnny Park!”) and moving epics that are still radio staples today (“Everlong,” arguably the best song Grohl has ever written). The emotional punch of the album stems from Grohl’s 1996 divorce, and when he and the Foos took the Electric Factory stage on July 10th, 1997, there was an undeniable urgency to the proceedings.

Tomorrow, the Foo Fighters of the 21st century roll down 95 to play their second Philly-area show of the summer at the Susquehanna Bank Center. Even with most of the same members, they’re a different band – Grohl’s self-assurance and charisma has multiplied by like a bajillion times since those early days. Sure, he still tries to put across a down-to-earth, man-of-the-people persona and tongue-in-cheekily jabs at ridiculous rock star tropes – I’m thinking of Foo Fighters set at Firefly 2014, where the encore saw the band morphing into The Holy Shits!, their classic rock cover band alter ego that chugged solo cups of beer and covered Alice Cooper and Queen – but there’s no getting around the fact, seeing the crowd’s devotion and the way the Foos feed off of it, that they embody those tropes as well. And that’s okay: the world needs a rock star.

Still, sometimes (when a dude is screaming at you from atop a throne, perhaps, which Grohl may or may not have in action tomorrow) it’s nice to step back and revisit an artist’s simpler roots. We came across this vintage video of Foo Fighters at the Electric Factory in 1997 on YouTube over weekend, and thought we’d share. Watch it below, contrast it with footage from their July 6 show at SBC here, and get tickets and more information at the XPN Concert Calendar.

Setlist
Wind Up
Wattershed
Hey Johnny Park
Monkey Wrench
Alone + Easy Target
Doll
See You
My Poor Brain
For All The Cows
Enough Space
Big Me
Weenie Beenie
February Stars
Everlong
New Way Home
This Is A Call
Up In Arms
I’ll Stick Around

After a massive 4th of July show in D.C. over the weekend, Foo Fighters bring their tour to Susquehanna Bank Center tonight. The fate of the national tour was in question a few weeks ago after lead singer Dave Grohl fell off of a stage in Sweden and broke his leg, but he’s back together and ready to rock out the band’s extensive catalog. Check out the video for “Best of You” below and pick up tickets to the outdoor show here.

Local emo rockers Modern Baseball have hit the road again, bringing their tour with Say Anything and Cymbals Eat Guitars to Lancaster’s Chameleon Club tonight. Last we heard from the band, they were putting out a call to fans for photos of dogs wearing sunglasses. Think about that while you watch their video for “Pothole” below. Tickets and information for the all ages show can be found here.